This is a great article about information literacy. Please read the entire thing and then think about it. Here’s the first paragraph.
Despite having more information at our fingertips than any generation before, there is little evidence that our ability to make
good, timely decisions has improved. A musician is not someone with an instrument and a songbook. Similarly, to be “information
literate” – able to extract knowledge from the welter of choice – we need to know how to orchestrate the technologies and “listen”
for the results. As a society we are computer and internet literate yet information literacy lags. We have computer hardware and
software but often ignore “wetware” – the first, most important, cog in the information seeking machine is ourselves.
The article also provides a great definition of information literate seeker:
The information-literate seeker “understands cultural, ethical, legal and socioeconomic issues surrounding” IT and “follows laws, regulations, institutional policies and etiquette related to the access and use of information resources”.
Worth a look!
This is a great article. It makes me think the U.S. public is a bit behind on this concept, but maybe it was just a bad day at the information desk…hmmmm.